The present invention relates to clamps and particularly to spring clamps having a spring for biasing the clamps toward a closed position. More particularly, the invention relates to clamps with an adjustment mechanism for adjusting the bias of the spring.
Spring clamps are well known in the art and come in a wide range of gripping strengths. For example, at one end of the spectrum, some clamps are quite large with enormous strength for holding large workpieces in various industrial manufacturing and repair applications. At the other end of the spectrum, home hobbyists use relatively weak clamps for holding small parts when assembling plastic models or the like.
Unfortunately, in many instances a particular clamp may be too strong (or weak) for a desired application. For example, an industrial strength clamp would crush the hobbyist's small plastic part, and is therefore unusable in the hobbyist application. Moreover, even in a particular situation, such as a workshop, a worker might have need for various gripping strengths, requiring separate clamps.
Maintaining an assortment of clamps for holding a variety of workpieces to cover a variety of jobs that a workman might be called upon to perform can be very costly. Thus, a single clamp that can be adjusted for use in a wide variety of applications would be very useful. A adjustable spring clamp that is economical to produce yet includes a simple and effective mechanism to adjust the amount of gripping strength would be very useful clamp and would be welcome by users.